


Wrong Number

by CasieMod



Category: Deus Ex (Video Games), Deus Ex: Black Light - James Swallow, Deus Ex: Human Revolution, Deus Ex: Mankind Divided
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, M/M, Missing Scene, Sad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-08
Updated: 2017-10-08
Packaged: 2019-01-10 12:01:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,046
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12298833
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CasieMod/pseuds/CasieMod
Summary: One night not long after he agrees to work with both the Juggernaut Collective and TF29, Jensen receives an unexpected late night call.





	Wrong Number

             The crisp air rolled over Jensen's face, exhilarating and refreshing him. It was early morning with just the slightest bit of overcast, but he loved days exactly like this. He walked barefoot on the sand, reveling in the simple pleasure of the slight sinking of the ground underneath, the fleshy pads of his feet feeling the grains as they spilled across them. He whistled and Kubrick came barreling at him, carrying a driftwood stick he scavenged from his explorations somewhere further down the beach. He was so eager to return to his master to show off his shiny new toy that he ran into Jensen, toppling him over in his enthusiasm. Adam didn't mind in the least. Kubrick dropped his find and was soon covering Adam in sloppy kisses, who couldn't help but smile. He just laid there and accepted his fate, eyes closed and grinning softly. Soon Kubrick calmed down and flopped right beside him onto his back, mimicking his owner, content and still. At that point, all Adam could hear was the soft rolling of the waves sporadically punctuated by distant sea gull cries.  Sometimes he'd take a break from staring up into the sky and briefly glance towards Kubrick, whose tail would softly start to wag every time he did. This.... this was a moment he could linger in. Such moments of peace were rare for him, so he wanted this one to last. But soon, the birds' cries took on a strange timbre. The calls sounded repetitive and unnatural and....blaring like some kind of annoying alarm.  
  
Adam woke with a start to realize it was his infolink going off. He pulled up the time. It was around 3am.

 _What the hell, I thought I'd set this to offline mode?_ , he pondered as he reluctantly took the call. For just one night he wanted to attempt to get the uninterrupted sleep he badly needed, but it was disturbed by...

  
"Francis?!"

  
"ShadoooowChilddddddd, You'lllll never BELIEVE what I got Windmill to do to his--  "

  
"Shadow Who?"

  
"HUh?!....ohhhhh waait, you're not ShadooowChiiild....you are SO FARRR from ShadowChild."

  
"It's 3 in the morning," Adam said annoyed, as he yawned and rubbed his eyes, "what the hell are y---... wait... wait wait wait. . . . . . . are you drunk?"

  
Adam could hear the telltale signs of inebriation in Frank's voice, the over-emphasis on certain words, the highly animated  intonations and halting, slowed down cadences. Sure, on just about any day the hacker was normally given to some sort of theatrics, but this sounded to Jensen like Pritchard ^2.

  
"I AAAAM NOT.....well mAYBe just a BIT, but that was maybe an HOUR ago, I'm--- TOTALLY FIIIINE right now. Sometimes it just happens you say ONE thing and meant to say another. The uh, infolink must have picked up STUPID EX-SECURITY CHIEF from my contacts instead of ShadowChild, IT WAS AN ACCIDENT!"

  
Jensen tried to contain his mirth at the over explanation.  
"Francis, are you saying you mentally butt dialed me ?" he said with a short laugh, now mostly awake and keen to tease the drunken hacker.

  
"SO WHAT if I did?! It's not like you were getting back to me any time soon, IF EVER!"

  
About a week after Pritchard had vacated the Rialto and found a new setup, he'd contacted Jensen to harangue him about the Collective but also inquire about TF29. He wouldn't work with one, especially after they so unceremoniously insulted him, but had no issues seeking work with the other. He tried to subtly drop hints to Jensen to see if TF29 could use someone of his talents, since it was clear to Frank that Jensen would end up working with them. Despite remarking to Jensen that they _weren't_ friends during their last meeting, he found he wasn't against the thought of working with the former security chief again. Over the course of their trials thus far, he'd come to gain a begrudging respect for Jensen's abilities, and he couldn't help but document everything that had happened to them, resulting in the compendium contained in that pocket secretary he'd given to Jensen as a parting gift.

  
At the same time, Frank also felt that it was _his_ advice that could help set Jensen on a better path, namely one that involved still being alive. Even further underneath it all, a small part of him would say that he thought they made a great team, not that he would admit it to Jensen in a normal sober state.   Especially not after Jensen ended their last call noncommittally, and after a couple weeks of absolutely zero communication, it became clear to Frank that he was just blowing him off. And now here he was, almost another week later, _accidentally_ drunk dialing his former co-worker.

  
"Sometimes your social skills just SUCK, Jensen. . . ." Frank said softly and rather dejectedly. It sounded as if he was going to go on and say more, but Jensen _just had to_ jump on what he'd already said.

  
Adam scoffed amusedly, "Oh I just wish you could see the irony of that statement."  
He did feel a twinge of guilt. He had been avoiding returning Frank's call, but he moved on instead of addressing it.

  
"Since when did the mighty Pritchard start getting drunk? I thought you hated booze."

  
"That's NONE of your business, Jensen."

  
"It is if you wanted to start working with me at TF29."

  
"I'm not a raging alcoholic like you are and that didn't seem to stop THEM from being interested in YOU."

  
"You aren't exactly writing yourself a glowing recommendation here. You know I can just go, you only _mistakenly_ called me anywa---"

  
"DON'T YOU DAAAARE hang up on me! Youuuu are gonna stay on this line and we're gonna have ourselves a friendly little chat or. . . or I'll turn your smart home into Siberia for the next week!" Pritchard spoke deviously in a way that made Jensen double-take because it sounded _almost flirtatious_ , much to his confusion. He figured he must be hearing it wrong. Despite this, Jensen gave a short laugh and responded nearly in kind.

  
"It's not friendly to threaten to hijack my home to freeze my balls off, Francis."

  
"Neither is it friendly to blow me off when I was ATTEMPTING to extend a hand towards you. To think I was even starting to consider you a friend!"

  
Jensen scoffed at the ridiculousness of the conversation. The tech was all over the place. He was shitfaced indeed and Jensen was simultaneously a mixture of annoyed, confounded, and fascinated. He'd never seen Frank talk like this before.

  
In fact, the hacker seemed to be drunk enough that it was having a truth serum effect on him and Jensen began to wonder what else he might spill the beans on. Perhaps something useful. And Jensen had to admit, there was something that he had wondered about that struck him as odd when he first learned of it back at the Rialto, but the timing didn't permit him a chance to reflect on it much. It had lingered at the back of his mind, and now that there wasn't a desperate time-sensitive mission to accomplish, it thrust itself to the fore in the wake of this perfectly golden opportunity. Against his better judgment, he prodded.

  
"You know, since we're talking about being friendly here, I was wondering..... why did you even hang onto so much of my stuff from the office in the first place? Were you gonna sell the gear off or just play dress-up of a character from your script?" Jensen internally chuckled at the latter thought.

  
The line was deathly silent for a while, to the point that Jensen's smirk disappeared from his face. He suddenly got the impending sense something bad was about to happen and he was going to regret what he'd said.

  
"Yeah, maybe I did want to sell it off. . . " the hacker sneered. ". . . . . . or MAYBE, JUST MAYBE I actually refused to believe you were DEAD, you prick. Maybe I persisted in believing you were still alive beyond all REASONABLE suggestion, after everyone else had GIVEN UP." Frank's tone consistently rose along with the quickening of the pacing of his words.

  
"Maybe I hacked into your accounts looking for clues, maybe I put feelers out in the underground looking for SOMeTHING, ANYTHING. Maybe I spent weeks finding NOTHING." These last sentences were punctuated with a few sniffs.

  
 Jensen couldn't see it, but he could hear it; Frank was angry and that anger was in part expressing itself in tears. And yet Jensen couldn't bring himself to do anything more but sit there and listen, like he had to hear Frank out because it was the least he could do.

  
"Maybe every time I passed by your office, I was constantly reminded of the FAILURE of my efforts. Maybe I couldn't SLEEP for nights on end with that in my head. Maybe I got so caught up in having to keep an eye on you that the concern I was REQUIRED to have for you because of my job ended up . . ." Frank said and then paused briefly. He spoke the last few words more softly than the others.

". . . becoming something else. . . ."

  
 Jensen swallowed hard, his face flushed hot, and he shifted to sitting up on the bed so that his feet were now on the ground. He felt like he needed to run, but there was no running away from a voice in your head. It was a voice that spoke just as loud and clear as the one currently on the other end of the infolink. _You're a ghost......a fuckin' tragedy....._

  
That other voice in his head continued, anger renewed.

  
"And then, AND THEN you just up and WALTZ BACK INTO MY LIFE asking me to do YOU a favor like nothing after ALL THAT TIME! " Frank's tone peaked at this point and his next words were quiet in comparison.  "..... after I thought I'd put it all behind me." Adam could hear a tremor in Frank's voice.

  
 "You have _no idea_ how much I..... how much I. . . .I. . . ." Frank was so torn up by this point it was getting hard for him to speak.

  
Something seized up inside Jensen, and he could feel a drop in his stomach. His first instinct was that he had couldn't let this continue any more.

  
"Francis..."

  
". . . because you're such a fool. . . . .you make me feel like one, too, because . . . because I --"

  
"FRANCIS! STOP!" Jensen was now up on his feet and pacing around, gesticulating even though no one could see him.

" . . . . . .Okay you know what, it's late and you're really drunk and saying stuff you don't even mean, much less remember when you wake up later today with a splitting headache." The words came out quickly as if Jensen was trying to put out a fire, but the next words were more measured and emphasized to try to make it clear for Frank.

"How about you do us both a favor and if you remember nothing else, remember this request of mine: **never ping my location again**. . ."  
It came out with more of an irate manner than intended, to Jensen's own surprise. Immediately regretting that, he took a moment to collect himself before continuing.

  
 ". . . . . . . .except, in an emergency. . . . Look, you're right . . . . I really owe you one, Pritchard. So if you're in a bind and need my help, I got your back. But until that time, just. . . pretend I don't exist, okay?" He unconsciously shook his head as he said it.

  
It hurt Jensen to say that, but in his mind, it needed to be done. He waited expectantly for a response from Pritchard but the hacker remained quiet. Jensen couldn't take the silence. He felt exhausted.

  
"Please. . . . . for both our sakes right now, just go to sleep. Goodbye. "

  
The former security chief cut the link and immediately headed to the kitchen to pour himself a whiskey. He then strode over to a window, opened it, and the very chilly night air greeted his very hot face. Jensen downed his drink in one go, then just stood there, trying not to think too much, and failing. After a while exposed to the near freezing temperature, Adam found himself sniffling. He attributed it to the cold.

**Author's Note:**

> This drabble was prompted by the beginning of System Rift, when Jensen says he had told Pritchard to never ping his location again. He never says that in Black Light, so it felt like a missing scene to me. Skartoargento had some similar feelings to me about what that missing scene might entail and I just had to write my version of it. Now please excuse me while I go to the corner to cry over Jensen and Pritchard a bit more.


End file.
